Connecticut Standards for Mathematics

The common core state standards for high school mathematics in Connecticut are separated into conceptual categories.  I chose to focus on the Algebra conceptual category.  The obvious reason that I chose Algebra is that I teach Algebra.  In particular, I would like to focus on the section "creating equations".  

For example, one standard talks about graphing linear and quadratic functions.  I can use the tactile learning style by having my students set up a table with a given domain and evaluate a function by inputting numbers to find the range.  Students would then plot points on a graph on the coordinate plane.  Here, the visual learning style would be employed because students would see, for example, the difference in the graph of a linear function vs. a quadratic function.  I would use the audio learning style by explaining step by step what we are accomplishing.

Teddy Bears Go Blogging

The Teddy Bears Go Blogging article was very interesting.  I am familiar with the Teddy Bear Project because my children participated in a similar project at school in second grade.  I thought that it was very creative and innovative for the author, Brenda Sherry to use a blog instead of email.  She mentioned that the Teddy Bear Project was designed to incorporate the use of the internet, global participation and collaboration.  The article was written in 2006.  This was a time when blogs were a relatively new thing on the internet, so this was probably very exciting for the students, the teachers and the parents to learn how to blog.

As mentioned, an important aspect of the project was global participation.  It is extremely important for students to become familiar with different cultures.  This project is an excellent way for students to learn about a different part of the world on a first hand basis.  Brenda Sherry explained that blogging had the advantage of reaching out to a wider audience.  She mentioned that parents and relatives began to read and comment on the blogs.  This was exciting to me because this meant that even more people were able to learn about different cultures.   

Deb’s Mathematics Blog

When looking at the list of recommended blogs, I decided that it would be most helpful to look at some math blogs.  Therefore I went to the link, movingforward – Education Blogs by Discipline.  I looked at several of the math logs.  Many were for younger students.  I thought a few were very interesting, especially Dan Meyer’s, Jason Dyer’s and Deb’s Mathematics Blog.  In the end, after printing out some very useful Algebra worksheets, I decided to focus on Deb’s Mathematics Blog.

It is very exciting for me to look at these math blogs.  It feels like a whole new world of math, although it is a bit overwhelming.  I like Deb’s blog because it focuses a lot on teaching math.  There were several posts with great links for free math worksheets.  One post talked about the benefits of students writing math journals in class.  Math journals are helpful because the students are better able to remember how to solve problems by writing down the steps.  Also, by writing a journal, students are forced to really think about how each math problem is solved. 

Another post that I found to be useful was about SAT problems.  My classes always begin with a warm up problem.  This SAT post had many links to some excellent SAT questions.  I will definitely use some of them as warm up problems.  Lastly, a teacher wrote a post saying that she loved to use math quotes in class.  Periodically, she will write a quote on the board and have a short discussion with the students about the quote.  I thought that this was an excellent idea for my classes.  Of course, math can be a bit of a dry subject.  It is always nice to be able to mix things up a little.

1st blog post

Blogging my first post in MD400